Executive MBA Ranking 2022: Rising in the East

Business schools in East Asia have strengthened their position as the world’s leading providers of Executive MBAs in the US 2022 FT EMBA Rankingdespite pandemic and political disruption.

Three programs from the region took the top spots: in the order Kellogg-HKUST in Hong Kong, Ceibs in Shanghai and the Tsinghua-Insead EMBA in China and Singapore. Two are run by international partners, while Ceibs has common European leadership and makes frequent use of guest lecturers.

Another four schools in the top tier of 11 have bases in Hong Kong, China or Singapore: Chicago booth, University of Washington: OlinTriums New York University and UCLA Anderson with the National University of Singapore.

The ranking underscores the continued strong performance of schools in the region with global partnerships and the success of their graduates alongside those enrolled in EMBA programs in Europe and North America.

FT Executive MBA Ranking 2022

Find out which schools are participating our ranking of EMBA degrees. Also, learn how the table was created and read the rest of our coverage at ft.com/emba.

However, amid the coronavirus lockdowns and ongoing movement restrictions, as well as rising geopolitical and trade tensions, there is uncertainty about the delivery of business education to overseas students in East Asia. There are similar questions about EMBAs from schools in Russia, isolated by its war against Ukraine.

The 2022 ranking comes at a time when the requirements of students and teachers are changing, both in terms of the content of the courses and the way in which they are taught. The FT’s methodology is based on data provided by business schools and their alumni three years after the completion of their programs.

The ranking takes into account factors such as salaries, career performance reviews, goals achieved and the quality of academic research, as well as gender balance and the international diversity of students and teachers.

Prof. Ding Yuan, dean of Ceibs, which was set up by the Chinese government and the European Union, says that while demand for his Chinese-language EMBA among local students remains high, he is temporarily halting the marketing of the global one due to quarantines degree to international candidates and visa restrictions.

“It’s very complicated for people to travel,” he says. “Chinese demand is very strong, but it is just beginning to open up to student visas for international students. It’s already too late for this year and we’re not sure about next year yet.”

Prof. Kai Lung Hui is the Academic Director of the premier Kellogg-HKUST EMBA program, which teaches many of its students remotely, including in Singapore and the United States. “Classes are running as usual and we’re still giving students the highest level of interaction they could have given the restrictions imposed by Covid,” he says.

He notes that there is an increasing demand among students for courses related to sustainability and technology, including blockchain, digital contracts, business analytics and fintech.

More broadly, business schools are looking at ways to maintain online formats introduced during the pandemic while returning to face-to-face classes. That Wharton School The University of Pennsylvania introduced one of the first blended global EMBAs among leading schools this year, priced the same as its classroom courses but with about three quarters offered remotely, mixed with phases in Philadelphia, San Francisco and other places .

“We’ve enforced ‘one size fits all,’ but there are clearly people with different preferences, different types of jobs and different family situations,” said Brian Bushee, Wharton’s senior vice dean of teaching and learning. “We want to appeal to those business people who, due to the travel commitments, would probably never personally consider an EMBA.”

The Graduate Management Admissions Council’s latest annual global survey of business degree programs late last year showed that only a third of schools reported an increase in the number of applications.

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The top two schools in the FT ranking also reported the highest alumni salaries, led by Kellogg-HKUST at $584,197 adjusted for international purchasing power parity. The Yale School of Management in the USA took first place in the evaluation of the goals achieved, followed by This business school in Spain and the University of St Gallen in Switzerland.

Schools that achieved gender parity among teachers were IE Business School, Koç University Graduate School of Business, IBS Moscow Ranepa and Graduate School of Management of St. Petersburg University. The only school that achieves student gender parity is the St. Petersburg Graduate School of Management, closely followed by University of Maryland: Smith (52 percent female), French schools wedge (51) and Rennes (48), plus the University of Washington: Foster (48).

The top EMBA research provider, based on a ranking of recent publications in leading academic journals, was University of Pennsylvania: Wharton, followed by University of Chicago: Booth, MIT: Sloan, Instead of this and Northwest University: Kellogg.

Among those that have an emphasis on environmental, social and governance factors in their curriculum, Iese Business School took first place, followed by IE Business School. TBS education, EMLyon Business School and ESCP Business School.

Of the 85 business schools offering EMBAs both this year and last year, the median salary was $213,000 in 2021 and increased only slightly to $214,000 in 2022. Total enrollments this year rose slightly to 7,737, with just over a third being women of the total and just over two-fifths international students.